At least on paper, the Winnipeg Jets are not as good as they were yesterday.

When a franchise loses its No. 2 centre, that fact can’t be disputed.

As veteran centre Paul Stastny chose to join the Vegas Golden Knights on a three-year deal worth $19.5 million on Sunday, the Jets were left with an opening at second-line centre.

It’s important to remember that it was always going to be a challenge for Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff to keep Stastny in the fold – though that didn’t prevent Cheveldayoff from trying.

“The final conversation is always difficult for both sides because you put so much time and energy and emotion in it,” Cheveldayoff said on Sunday afternoon. “I haven’t had a chance to speak with Paul (Stastny), but I know it was a very difficult decision for him given the length of time we talked about things. When I talked to you guys last week, I said that’s something we would potentially hope would come together but we knew it would come with some challenges.

“We were able to cross the first hurdle and try and create the ability to just speak with him when we made the move to clear some cap space. If we were fortunate enough to have gotten him, there would have been a lot more surgery that would have been needed on the roster as well. It was never a situation about willing to pay or do anything like that. It was what we were able to do. While we offered the same term, obviously it wasn’t the same money.”

Given the Jets salary-cap challenges, Stastny was always going to need to take less money and term to stick around.

He was brought in as a rental and if he chose to stick around, it was going to be an obvious bonus for the Jets.

By my calculations, if the Jets had given Stastny up to a two or three-year deal for $5.5 or $6 million, they would have needed to move out another significant salary – someone like Tyler Myers or Mathieu Perreault – even after dealing Steve Mason and Joel Armia to the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday.

Don’t tell me Stastny is choosing simply to chase the money either.

Stastny wanted to play for a contender and obviously wanted to cash in financially as well.

With this decision, Stastny should be able to do both.

Instead of taking a significant pay cut from the $7 million per season he made on his four-year contract with the St. Louis Blues, Stastny ended up with an average annual value of $6.5 million for the next three years.

No, Stastny won’t be flanked by Patrik Laine or Nikolaj Ehlers, but he’s joining a team that eliminated the Jets and reached the Stanley Cup final in its first season in the NHL.

No matter how you slice it, the Jets and Golden Knights both view themselves as legitimate contenders.

The Golden Knights were able to land arguably the second-best centre on the market behind John Tavares, who surprised some by joining the Toronto Maple Leafs on a seven-year deal on July 1.

It’s not like the Jets were just going to move on to the next target in free agency either.

Much like at the trade deadline, when Stastny waived his no-movement clause to join the Jets in a deal with the Blues, the Jets are comfortable with the internal options available to try and fill the void.

Although Bryan Little is an obvious choice, Jack Roslovic is another candidate to move from the wing and into the middle – and move up the lineup in the process.

To this point of his young career, Jets head coach Paul Maurice has preferred to use Roslovic on the wing but at the NHL Draft, Maurice said he was open to the possibility of trying him in the middle.

The loss of Stastny is significant, there’s no doubt about that.

Stastny was a perfect fit, a good leader with ample playoff experience.

But the chances were always greater he would be moving on than staying.

After making a bit more of a splash on July 1 last summer by adding Mason and defenceman Dmitry Kulikov on multi-year deals, the Jets were going to be more of a minor player this time around.

When young budding stars move out of their entry-level contracts (or second contracts) and are looking to get paid big dollars, the cash crunch is on.

The Jets still have a busy summer ahead of them, even after signing backup goalie Laurent Brossoit to a one-year, one-way deal worth $650,000.

That’s a serious cost savings, though it’s tough to project what the Jets are going to get from Brossoit, given the small NHL sample size (29 games).

There are eight restricted free agents who need new contracts, including core pieces like goalie Connor Hellebuyck and top pairing blue-liners Jacob Trouba and Josh Morrissey, all of whom are looking for raises.

“I don’t know if there were a lot of people, quite honestly, thought there was even a chance that we were going to be able to bring back (Stastny),” said Cheveldayoff. “When the season ended, we had a great conversation. He expressed his willingness and desire to, if we could make it work to come back. When it’s all said and done, you guys are going to look at the salary cap and roster and say, ‘OK, how were they going to do this anyway? Again, we’ve got a good group of guys here and we’ve got lots of work ahead of us on our RFAs. That’s where things pick up on July 2.

“We don’t anticipate from that standpoint that additional surgery would be needed. The only caveat that I go back to is that the numbers we project are in pencil. We feel like we’re in a good spot with our projections.”

The Jets have the organizational depth to absorb the loss of Stastny, but if they don’t want to trade the 2019 first-round draft pick to load up before the NHL trade deadline, the internal options are going to need to step up.

The Central Division still looks like the toughest in hockey and several of those clubs the Jets will be jockeying for position with got better.

The Jets didn’t win July 1.

But there are several months before the season gets going and the true impact of Stastny’s departure won’t be felt until the stretch drive and eventually, the playoff run.

Although the cost of acquiring Stastny was steep (a 2018 first-rounder and forward prospect Erik Foley), there’s little doubt the nine playoff wins he contributed to were well worth it for the Jets.

Even as he moves on, the lessons Stastny helped impart on this group will be felt for years to come.

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